Historically, people have shopped from the comfort of their homes (or offices) using printed paper catalogs. The traditional printed catalog typically is a multi-page book containing a large array of product pictures and descriptions and detailed information for purchasing such products.
Each page of a typical printed catalog page may include a title, which is the category of products presented on the page, and number of presentations for products appearing within the category name. Typically, each presentation includes a picture of the product, a headline defining the benefits of the product, copy beneath the headline describing various features of the product, including, for example, size, color and weight, and detailed information and pricing for ordering the product from the catalog company.
Also included in a typical printed catalog is an order form for purchasing selected products using the ordering information. The ordering information for desired products is placed on the order form, which is then mailed to the catalog company. Alternatively, a purchaser can call what is typically a toll-free number to speak to a catalog company representative who takes the information for processing product purchases.
More recently, the Internet has become a vehicle for electronic commerce and a viable alternative for in home (or office) purchases of products from companies that maintain a website from which product information may be obtained and products ordered. Many company websites include an electronic version of the company's paper product catalogs. These electronic catalogs typically include a “page” index and electronic versions of the “pages” comprising the catalog. The page numbers listed in the page index are hyperlinks which, when clicked by a customer, cause a file for a requested catalog page to be retrieved for display on a customer's computer.
The Internet is a global communications system in which a vast number of computers and other devices are networked to allow customer-to-customer communications and transfers of data files from one machine to any other on the network. The World Wide Web serves as one type of interface to the Internet that allows customers to readily navigate the Internet's vast resources. The Web allows information and data dispersed across the Internet to be linked in an easily accessible way. This information or data typically includes text, graphics, illustrations, sound and video.
The World Wide Web uses a client/server architecture in which client programs, called web browsers, running on customers' computers request data from server programs running on other computers known as servers, which are located elsewhere on the Internet. The data requested by a customer's browser is typically part of a website maintained by a company or other entity. When the browser program requests the data, a web server hosting the website sends the requested data back over the Internet to the browser, which then interprets and displays the data on the customer's computer screen. Thus, a web browser is a computer program or application that has the ability to request data from any server on the Internet and interpret and display on a customer's computer the data sent by a server through the Internet. Conversely, a web server is a computer program that responds to web browser requests for data and sends the requested data to the web browser through the Internet.
A web page is typically a file that contains HTML (hypertext mark-up language) files containing text and graphics, along with a set of HTML tags that describe how the text and graphics should be formatted and displayed on a customer's computer screen. The tags are instructions that tell the web browser how the page should look when it displays the page on a customer's computer. So, for example, the tags serve to change the font size or color, arrange things in columns, etc. The graphics or images on web pages are typically either GIF files or JPG files. The GIF files are generally used for drawn graphics, while the JPG files are generally used for photographs or scanned images.
The World Wide Web uses an addressing system known as a Uniform Resource Locator (URL). A URL consists of four parts that, when combined, completely define the location of any file or service located anywhere on the Internet. These parts are the protocol, domain name, path, and filename. Thus, a customer's browser, in requesting a web page from a website, sends a message over the Internet that includes at least a transfer protocol (e.g., http://), and a domain name (e.g., www dot catalogcompanyname dot com). The last two components of a URL may or may not exist, depending on the location and type of information any given hyperlink points to. The server receives the customer's request and retrieves the requested web page or other file, which is composed in HTML. The server then transmits the requested page or other file back across the Internet to the customer's computer. The customer's browser program receives the HTML file and displays its interpretation of the requested file. Thus, browser programs send requests and receive the data needed to display the HTML page on a customer's screen. This includes the HTML file itself, plus each of the graphic, sound and video files mentioned in the HTML file. Once the data is retrieved, the browser formats the data as indicated by the HTML tags and displays it on the customer's computer screen.
Web pages are typically hypertext documents, i.e., documents which provide clearly visible links to other documents or web pages on the World Wide Web. When a customer clicks on a hypertext link, or hyperlink, a new request to retrieve another file is sent over the Internet. With a web browser, a customer typically sees formatted documents that contain text, graphics and highlighted hyperlinks. The browsers let a customer navigate the Internet, not by entering commands, but rather by moving a mouse pointer to a desired hyperlink and clicking. The browser establishes contact with the related server in a remote computer, and the server transfers the requested file to the customer's machine, displaying it in the customer's browser as another formatted, hyperlink document. Thus, a customer can “surf” the web by hopping from hyperlink to hyperlink without delving deeply into the contents of any particular document.
Customers connect to the Internet typically via a modem dial-up connection to an Internet Service Provider, although some connect via a direct line such as a T1 or a T3 line. Most modem dial-up connections occur over regular phone lines. These analog lines have limited bandwidth, which limits the rate of speed at which data can be transferred from the Internet to a customer's computer. Common transfer rates for modems used with analog phone lines are 28.8 and 56 Kbps. With a rate of data transfer of 28.8 Kbps, the download of a typical window screen consisting of 50 KBytes of data can take as much as 13 seconds, while a 1MegaByte image file at the same data transfer speed could take as much as 5 minutes. Thus, where you have a customer who is looking to download multiple catalog web pages, each of which contains multiple graphical images per page, a significant amount of time can be spent by the customer waiting for the download of each page, not to mention a number of catalog pages.
It is possible to reduce download time by subscribing to an improved connection service, such as ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) or DSL (Digital Subscriber Line). While such services allow for faster download times, they are not available in many locations, such as the rural locations where persons who traditionally use catalogs to shop live. Moreover, there is an additional expense to a customer of these services, which may not be affordable or justified, given the purpose for which a customer's computer and Internet connection may be used. This may be particularly the case where a customer operates his or her computer and Internet connection for personal purposes only.